Information Note On Our Martyred Diplomats And The Commemoration Ceremony To Be Held On 18 March Martyr’s Day At The Martyrs Cemetery Of The Ministry Of Foreign Affairs In Ankara

Republic Of Turkey Ministry Of Foreign Affairs 15.03.2019

Terrorists led by members of the terrorist organizations ASALA (Armenian
Secret Army for the liberation of Armenia), JCAG (Justice Commandos for the
Armenian genocide) and ARA (Armenian Revolutionary Army) perpetrated
attacks targeting our diplomats and their families during the 1970s and
1980s. In this context, first in 1973, our Consul General in Los Angeles
Mehmet Baydar and Consul Bahadır Demir were martyred by an Armenian
terrorist. Then, attacks related to Armenian terrorist organizations began
in Vienna when Ambassador Daniş Tunalıgil was martyred on 22 October 1975,
and subsequently seventy seven people in total, among them fifty eight
Turkish citizens (including thirty one diplomats and their families), lost
their lives and a great number of others were wounded.

Besides the attacks perpetrated by Armenian terrorists, Çetin Görgü, Deputy
Press Attaché of our Embassy in Athens, and Ömer Haluk Sipahioğlu,
Counsellor of our above-mentioned Embassy, were martyred in Athens by the
terrorist organization of November 17, respectively in 1991 and 1994. In
addition, in 1993 Çağlar Yücel, Administrative Attaché of our Embassy in
Baghdad, and in 2004 Security Attachés Nihat Akbaş, Bilal Urgen, Adem
Çiçek, Bülent Kıranşal and Süleyman Karahasanoğlu fell as martyrs in Mosul
while discharging their duties.

On the occasion of 18 March Martyr’s Day, we commemorate each year, through
ceremonies held in our country and at our foreign missions, our members who
became martyrs in various countries while they were representing our flag
and our nation. In this framework, a commemoration ceremony will be held on
Monday 18th of March 2019 at 10:30 at the Martyrs Cemetery of
the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Ankara. On the same day, a ceremony will
also be held by our local authorities and our Representative Office in
Izmir, at the Monument for Martyred Turkish Diplomats in Karşıyaka, Izmir.
Also, a wreath will be laid at the Monument for Martyred Turkish Diplomats
in Fethiye.

We attach utmost importance on honouring the sacred memories of our martyrs
with monuments and plaques erected/placed also in the locations where our
diplomats were martyred abroad. In this framework, works regarding
monuments/plaques in the memory of our martyrs have been completed in
Sydney, Ottawa, The Hague, Lisbon, Vienna and Burgas. Within the next
period, Belgrade and Vatican City will also be included in this list. We
continue to work for this purpose in other cities where we had martyrs. In
commemoration of our martyred diplomats, monuments were also erected in our
country. Thanks to the initiatives of the Municipality of Karşıyaka, a
monument was built in Karşıyaka, Izmir in 2008. Another monument was built
in 2015 in Fethiye, Muğla, thanks to the initiatives of the Municipality of
Fethiye.

The locations where our martyrs were murdered are marked on a virtual map
accessible from the website of our Ministry.